Xavier-Cincinnati Fight Highlights Hypocrisy Of Violence In Sports

If you love sports for the right reasons, you have to denounce in the strongest terms fist fights in sports outside of boxing and MMA. If the game is about scoring touchdowns, putting a ball in the hoop, or puck in a goal, fights are antithetical to us purists. And even worse, when players put on a uniform representing an institution of ­higher learning, the privilege to do so comes with the responsibility to carry that pristine banner above the banter of foul language or foul play. So when Xavier and Cincinnati basketball teams had a bench-clearing brawl we were outraged, offended, and embarrassed.

Therefore, when it comes to punishment, the respective institutions should send a message as they did. It could have been much like Oregon’s former running back LeGarrette Blount. He threw an impressive roundhouse hook that connected to the jaw of an opposing player who was jawing with him after Oregon’s first game loss. The University sent a message. One punch cost Blount one season, his last in college. Apparently the lesson was learned and Blount is having a very good professional career – punch free. If Blount-like punishment was imposed and the most recent boxer-ballers lost the season many would consider it appropriate. Instead the worst punishment is six games. Regardless of the amount of punishment, we all agree something was necessary. But is this all just about the players or are they receiving mixed messages from the rest of us?

If we so abhor punching in basketball, why are there already 25 separate YouTube videos the morning after? All highlight the most damaging punch, from Yancy Gates’ fist to Kenny Frease’s face. The first of those videos has fan commentary of a verbal “boom” on delivery of the punch and then a laugh. When Frease was then kicked after he was clocked, there was another “boom” and another laugh. More commentary: “ba-ba-boom-ya”, “down by decision”. By the time you read this, there will probably be hundreds of thousands of views. The commentator was disappointed it ended so soon. I dare say there are more who felt the same way in the privacy of their homes, as those who are publically outraged.

Even the purists among us should admit we don’t really deplore all violence in basketball. We just define some violence as more acceptable aggression than other forms of aggression. We want a delicate balance. I guess in hoops that means we only accept punch-free aggression no matter how many “hard fouls” during enemy layups, or body blows we teach and see when setting picks and blocking out opposing players for rebounds.

The commissioners from the respective conferences (Big East and Atlantic 10) officially decried the violence the morning after in press conferences and imposed punishment in addition to the NCAA’s one game suspension of indicted players. But those commissioners, the respective athletic directors, coaches, sports information directors and staff, and the TV and radio broadcasters all participated directly or indirectly by inaction, in creating the atmosphere and environment conducive for just this sort of over-the-edge-ness. This game was hyped as the “Crosstown Shootout”. Media successfully asked players questions that were carefully calculated to extract and facilitate the incendiary verbal jousting and mutual disrespect that added to the pre-game intensity. I fully expect the pre-game coach-speak was to prepare players to be more “physical” than the enemy. I fully expect the referees “let them play” as the fans would prefer. And regrettably, I also fully expect those commissioners, coaches, boosters, administrators, and media types to take no responsibility for building the culture that allowed it to happen. What did the coach, athletic director, and sports information director think the Xavier player was going to say in the post-game media session when he said they would, in rap terms, “zip ‘em up”? They already knew his comeuppance when he gets in front of the microphone after that experience. They apparently missed a teachable moment about media relations before he took the standard post-game stage. That’s their error. I also fully expect student fans that may have yawned during free throws, were totally consumed with the fight. Some of them will praise the right jab and even offer their brand of comfort and celebrity. That is their error.

All that said, we should not fear that the game is lost to gangsta-rapper ballers. Over 3,450 Division 1 college basketball games have already been played this season. This is the first and probably the last such incident available for another YouTube commentary. And if we fear that big time college sports is losing its role models look no further than an event that occurred the same night during the same time as the fista-hoop game. That event was the Heisman Trophy Award program. The candidates included Trent Richardson, a B+ business student, and Heisman winner Robert Griffin III. Griffin was 7th in his high school class, and a world class hurdler, who sped through college academia with the same efficiency and apparently in route to law school. Some teams are so desperate for wins and money they take a chance on high risk teenagers, players who did not have the RGIII blessing of being raised by Army Sergeants, which he says provided a home “where disciple was huge”.

Let the player punishment send the message, but let’s not play fantasy basketball and say, “Oh my God, how could this happen”. Fans rush to it, administrators support the violence at a level and coaches constantly pound physicality in the mentality of the players. The media has overly publicized Michigan State’s football shoulder pads during basketball practice. MSU is one of the most successful high profile programs in America, and not coincidentally among the leading rebounding teams annually. I’m guessing about 335 of the 345 D-1 hoops programs envy and emulate the MSU success, the multiple final four appearances and the toughness it takes to get there.

The MSU physicality is different of course from punches, but only in degree, not in kind. Both are forms of aggression. It is an important nuance to prepare players to put their bodies on the enemy in a skillful yet forceful way, yet teach them not to get so angry when the enemy returns the favor that the teenager overreacts and turns a hip check or high elbow into a straight jab. My point is this is more a nuance than crime and punishment. There is a fine line not a bright line difference between them. MSU’s Tom Izzo is picking the right players and teaching the nuanced violence the right way. So are hundreds of other coaches and hundreds of players who execute the requisite discipline and balancing act. Yet the adults who create the hype, the style of play, and administrations that acquiesce to it should take a little responsibility without all the aftershock when the inevitable brawl or two break out each year. I’ve given up on thinking we can un-mix the message. The least we can do is admit our own complicity in the creation.

Roger M. Groves is a Professor of Law at Florida Coastal School of Law, teaching business and sports courses and director of The Center for Sports and Social Entrepreneurship. Visit Roger at http://center4players.com/ and follow him at Twitter@rgroveslaw.

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